Weber heading panel on racial concerns

Political Notebook

Assemblywoman Shirley Weber has been selected by Speaker John Pérez to head up a special panel charged with examining the racial climate on state university and college campuses.

The panel was created in the wake of an alleged hate-crime against a black student at San Jose State University, where four white students are accused of hurling racial slurs at their black roommate and attempting to put a bicycle lock around his neck last fall.

“It’s clear from this particularly disturbing incident — one that harkens back to uglier times in our nation’s history — that we still have a lot of work to do to insure California’s college campuses are safe and welcoming educational environments for every student,” Weber said. “My committee colleagues and I will be holding hearings over the next year to explore the current campus climate for students throughout the CSU, UC and Community College systems and consider what policy changes are necessary to improve it.”

Mayoral ballots head out

County Registrar Michael Vu is sending out vote-by-mail ballots to about 336,000 city of San Diego voters Monday as the Feb. 11 election between Kevin Faulconer and David Alvarez officially begins.

Close to half of the city’s 682,839 registered voters choose to mark their ballots at home and send them back to Vu’s office rather than go to the polls on Election Day, when close to 500 polling places will be open. Mail ballots are the first counted when the polls close at 8 p.m.

Issa foe hunting signatures

It’s not easy for first-time candidates to raise money for a run against a long-time incumbent. Just ask Encinitas resident Dave Peiser, a Democratic challenger to Rep. Darrell Issa in 2014, who is hunting for 3,000 signatures of registered voters in the 49th Congressional District in order to get his name on the ballot in lieu of paying a filing fee.

Peiser, a political newcomer, would rather use the $1,740 filing fee for campaigning against Issa, the Vista Republican and seven-term incumbent who had more than $2.6 million in his campaign account at the end of October. A signature is worth 58 cents toward the filing fee, and Peiser and supporters are hitting sites in Vista, Carlsbad and Oceanside to gather them.

Tweet of the Week

Goes to Erik Bruvold, National University System Institute of Policy Research president, who issued this bon mot on upcoming Alvarez-Faulconer mayoral scrums: “My dream question in the next Mayoral Debate — ‘Name three things you love about San Diego.’ If one says ‘weather,’ vote for the other guy.”